A Baby's Steps

Hello, all. Had my wake up juice and was thinking about several things on my to-do list for the day. I'm sure that you are up and about since I am posting late. I have been up for quite a while, but I had several issues to take care of before talking to you.

But I am ready to talk to you now. I am a bit excited! Not about much, but it does not take much to excite me. What am I excited about? Well, I like the fact that the Lord has allowed me to learn how to put a video on my blog at any time that I choose. That means that I do not have to say to you that I wish that you could hear me sing a certain song or say certain words. A way has been provided! Yep, that makes me happy. Yes, I get happy when I do some service for the Lord and talking to you is a service for Him. So we both benefit from our blogging sessions. (tee hee)

Alright, enough of the niceties. I want you to walk back through your mind's eye to the time when your child was learning to walk, be it a few hours ago, weeks ago or years ago. Do you remember how that sweet little baby would reach for you and maybe whine a little? And then you would hold your arms out to him and encourage him to walk by using your best encouraging baby voice and say, "Come on; come to Momma (Daddy.) Remember how the baby would raise his arms and judge the distance from you to him and sometimes just plop down and tear up because he wanted to be held but he could not get to you? He had become so used to being held that it was difficult for him to trust his own feet. A lot of us, as Christians, are like that little baby in that we are often afraid to try new things for the Lord for fear of failure.

Then again, there are those of us who have been walking solo for a long time. And when life comes along and knocks us to our knees, we flounder and falter, but manage to get back up. But, here's the rub. Oftentimes after we have been slammed very hard, we are like that little baby, who had managed to convince himself to walk because he wanted to be picked up and coddled, etc. Remember how heart broken the little fellow was when he tried to walk and had to sit down hard on his bottom because he was losing his balance? Remember, how he then learned from that sit-down and used that sitting down motion anytime he felt like he might fall. Some of us, as Christians, manage to do some work for the Lord, but use the sitting down method quite a bit. We might sit and scoot toward our goal when we could walk and get it done faster.

Still, there are others of you who, have mastered the walking rather well and have learned to, flat out run. But, when the adversary orchestrates the circumstances of your life so that you take a tumble and fall hard, you get disillusioned. Sometimes the fall is so hard that it breaks your shield of faith that you thought was so strong.

You end up bruised, broken, faith shards at your feet and distrusting. You decide to keep on working, but you become a scooter. Some of you get back up, but you take, little not very much faith, baby steps. You might take a step toward the doorway that you saw your parent (the Lord) disappear into trying to get to where He is,  but you can't see the evidence of His presence, so just like that little baby, you start to whimper and cry. Remember how you were there all of the time peeking around the corner watching the baby as he was learning to walk. You knew that the baby had the ability to walk for you, but that he didn't have the confidence. So you taught him that he could. If he whimpered, you stepped around the corner so that he could see you and with tears swimming in his little eyes, you waited for him to walk to you, even though you wanted to run to him and grab him up in a bear hug. When he made it to you, you smothered him with hugs, kisses, and much love. I wanted to say that the baby situation can be likened to living a Christian life.

• The Lord, as our Parent, teaches us that we can do things that we thought that we couldn't.
• He teaches us to call on Him.
• He teaches us that life can get rough, but that He will always have a watchful eye and ear out for us, even when we cannot see evidence of His being near.

In short, He allows life to humble us to the extent that we take tiny steps of faith with tears swimming in our eyes just like that little baby did. We must remember the sweet celebration that will occur when we get to Him. All of the falls will be forgotten when we reach Him when He dries our eyes with tenderness just like we used to do to that little baby. So let's keep working for Him, folks, taking baby steps when we have to, but stepping all the same. It will be worth it, by and by!

Doing What I Can, While I Can,
Grammy Alma Jones

I didn't see this one coming, folks! But, that happens a lot of the time, so I have just learned to write as I am inspired to do, you know?